This announcement is an important step towards IDF and NCD Alliance goals of integrating diabetes and NCDs into a post 2015 framework. It comes just a few days after the heads of WHO and UNDP issued a joint letter urging UN country offices to include NCDs in UN Agency programmes.

It also signals that the UN and governments acknowledge NCDs as a serious health and development challenge, alongside maternal health, child mortality and infectious diseases like HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria.

The decision is the result of intense advocacy by IDF and the NCD Alliance, including the submission of a think piece on NCDs in the post 2015 development framework to UNDP.

The piece aims to safeguard progress made on the MDGs and drive sustainable and equitable development, keeping health at the heart of the framework. It also calls for a redefinition of the approach to health in order to reflect the current health landscape and priorities of Low and Middle Income Countries (LMCs) in 2015. By doing so, the impact of health on the other human development indicators will be greater.